The Unspoken

A couple pushed past Kat as if she wasn’t even there. “It’s cursed! The ship is cursed!” the man said to the young woman at his side. “Oh, God! What they should do is cast out the cargo, clear us of the curse!”

“You’re scaring me!” the young woman cried.

“I’m so sorry, my darling!” the man said.

Then the woman seemed to see her. She looked at her with wide, desperate eyes. “It’s the curse,” she said. “It’s the curse!”

“No, no, it’s a storm, that’s all,” Kat heard herself say reassuringly. She smiled at the young woman. But then she turned. There appeared to be something out on the water. Something huge coming toward them.

She felt another blast of cold. Wet cold. The lovely night had become treacherous. It wasn’t snow rushing at her; it was ice. They had sailed into an ice storm.

And still, that thing was out there, mammoth, a dark shadow that couldn’t quite take shape because of the raging elements.

The wind picked up again and seemed to strike her in the face.

Then she awoke, frozen.

Kat blinked. She was still in her room in the lovely California hotel where her Krewe was staying.

She almost laughed aloud. She was cold because she’d kicked away her covers. Jumping up quickly, she hurried over to the thermostat. Somehow, sometime, either she or the maid had set the temperature down to the fifties.

She reset the thermostat to eighty-five.

She was much fonder of heat than cold.

That done, she dragged the extra blanket from the closet, grabbed all her covers again and curled back into bed. She’d practically forgotten the dream, she’d been so cold.

As she lay down, she thought it had been quite absurd. But then, of course, dreams often were.

Next morning

9:00 a.m.

The water of Lake Michigan was eerie, with different shades of gray shadows and darkness, as Brady Laurie plunged into the chilly depths. Only near the surface could anything that resembled natural light or warmth be found; the lake had always been a place of darkness and secrets. Motes seemed to dance before his eyes as the dive light on his head illuminated his journey, ever deeper into the water. Tiny bits of grasses, sand, orts from the meals of the lake’s denizens swirled like dust particles, shimmering as his light hit them.

It was a world of silence down here, making every little noise sharp. The sound of his breathing and the throb of his regulator, the expulsion of his air bubbles, the very pulse of his heart.

It was a world he loved, but today he was on a mission.

He was so anxious. He shouldn’t have been diving alone; he knew that. It was against every rule of scuba and salvage, but people often did it, anyway. In fact, he’d met enough he-man types so sure of their own prowess that they ignored the rule all the time. He didn’t usually—just today.

He knew exactly what he was looking for, and the sonar on his boat seemed to have proven his theories and calculations right.

At long last, he’d found the sunken ship—the Jerry McGuen.

He believed in his heart that he’d found her, the freighter that had carried sixty men and women to their graves, doomed along with the treasures they’d brought from Egypt. The ship had sailed faultlessly all the way across the Atlantic Ocean and up the Saint Lawrence River, only to be lost on December 15, 1898, a day before the journey’s end, battered and buffeted by a sudden, fierce storm. She had disappeared so close to her destination, just east-northeast of Chicago.

People had speculated then, as they still did, that a curse had lain upon the ship. The explorer who’d made the Egyptian discovery, Gregory Hudson, had been aboard. And, of course, there’d been a threat, etched into the stones of the tomb, warning that any man who disturbed the final resting place of Amun Mopat would soon know misery and death. Surely the passengers and crew of the Jerry McGuen had known both—almost able to see Chicago, but storm-tossed in violent, winter-frigid waters, finally succumbing to the brutality of the lake and disappearing.

Yes, the ship had disappeared, never to be seen again.

Until today. He would see her again. He, Brady Laurie, would see her again!

Salvage crews had hunted for her soon after she’d sunk—to no avail. And through the years, time after time, historians and divers had sought her, but like many a ship lost in the murky waters of the massive lake, she was simply not to be found.

Brady had been certain all his life that she had to be there. And he’d excitedly put forth his theory to his coworkers that, following their recent wicked summer storm, there was a chance she could now be discovered. Violent storms altered a lake bed, just as they could alter the seabed in the Atlantic. He had seen what storms could do. A ship sunk in Florida had gone down on her side; one of the storms that had torn apart the Florida Straits had set her up perfectly again. He believed the same strength and force of that phenomenon was going to reveal the Jerry McGuen.

Storms moved sand and dirt. Storms had tremendous power—enough power to right a multi-ton ship. Even one lost for more than a century, a true shipwreck. His calculations had been off, but not by much. Not if what the sonar had shown him was true.

Through the dark, mystic water of the lake, he saw her.

There she was. The Jerry McGuen!

She lay at an angle, starboard hull lodged into the lake bed, as majestic and visible in the glow of his dive light as if she were at dock.

His heart beat fast, and pride surged through him.

They’d done it! They’d found her.

No—he’d found her!

His theory was sound, his calculations making adjustments for time, weather conditions, the power of the recent storm and the earth’s rotations. It couldn’t account for the various unknowns, but he’d been so close. And now, as he saw it looming before him, his time had come. While that kind of storm usually sank ships, this one had removed layers of sand and almost righted the Jerry McGuen.

Yes, there she was, her massive hull tempting and seductive…

Even righted as she was, she had suddenly seemed to loom before him. The lake bed made the water so dark at eighty feet.

Just eighty feet! She’d been there all along, so damned close to Chicago!

He didn’t feel any cold through his dive suit, but he was numb. A shiver of excitement reverberated through his limbs. All around him, the water danced in the wavy shadows of the eighty-foot depths, and he became intensely aware of the sound of his own breathing again, the pump and flow of his regulator. He wanted to shout with happiness and share his discovery with the world. Of course, he would do that soon enough, and if any of his team had followed him out today, they’d already know that he’d been right. Everyone would know that he’d been right, including every salvage diver who had ever dreamed of finding her.

He laughed inwardly, smiling around his regulator. He was pretty sure someone had been behind him. Not that everyone on Lake Michigan had to be following him, but he thought he’d seen a research vessel in the distance when he’d come down.

His coworkers might be angry that he’d jumped the gun, but Amanda had already sold the story of their search to a film producer, who was going to document and finance their historic discovery. He’d supplied money for the search based on Brady’s theory. Now they could begin to chart out and rope off the ship and show the world the remains of the Jerry McGuen. Others interested in pursuits far less esoteric than theirs would be stopped at the gate. No more worries about Landry Salvage or Simonton’s Sea Search beating them to the punch!

He could imagine the treasures in the hold. Priceless Egyptian artifacts, the still-sealed coffin of the high priest known as the Sorcerer of Giza, the sarcophagi, the army of golden figures, the canopic jars, the ancient stones…

Underwater for more than a century, he reminded himself.

But even the Egyptologists of the nineteenth century had known about preservation. Sure, they hadn’t reckoned on toxins and gases, but they knew all about waterproofing—gunpowder and the pursuit of war had certainly furthered man’s knowledge of that!

Of course, the hold might have been compromised, a zillion things might have happened and still…what they might find!

He—they—didn’t seek treasure or the fortune it could bring. The treasures they discovered always went to museums, and he felt a thrill rush through him as he imagined the headlines when they returned the jeweled sarcophagus of Amun Mopat to the Egyptian people. Amun Mopat would be back where he rightfully belonged, and the name Brady Laurie would be revered in Cairo’s museum. Yes, yes, yes!

The Jerry McGuen.

She lay there—exposed! He was so elated his heart seemed to stop.